Mumbai: The bad air quality in Delhi which has entered the red zone is starting to have an impact on tourism as well since one of the flights scheduled for national capital Delhi with United airlines canceled its flight for two days.
The airline has decided to cancel its Newark-Delhi flights on Friday and Saturday which was supposed to arrive on Saturday and Sunday nights.
The United airlines operates Boeing 777 a 267-seated aircraft on the route from Newark to Delhi comprising of 14 hours of journey. No spokesperson was available to speak about the change of events and the airline’s transfer of its booked passengers to other airlines.
So far Tour operators were not affected but the Assocham Industry chamber on Friday said foreign tourists might skip Delhi in favor of other cleaner destinations.
Dipak Deva, Managing director of Tourism division, Thomas Cook group said: “The pollution has generated a lot of negative publicity for the destination (Delhi) globally. However, there have been no cancellations in bookings.”
Karan Anand, head (relationships), Cox & Kings, said: “We are not seeing any cancellations from tourists at this point. Guests are arriving according to schedule and they move out of Delhi immediately, so there is no cause for concern.”
Assocham, which has recently interacted with 350 tour operators, said: “International tourists are quite particular about their health and safety. In the wake of such negative developments, Delhi is bound to drop off the map of international tourists, who might pick ‘cleaner’ South Asian destinations. Even domestic tourists are avoiding Delhi.”